


i know you'd fool me again

by dancinghopper



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: 5+1 Things, M/M, PLS READ the notes if u have triggers relating to panic attacks, Sort Of, but most of it was dumb so like only barely, i have read and edited this so many times that i dont really like it anymore, im in a bit of a spiral, it is laid out in detail, semi s2 compliant, so im just POSTIN TO BE DONE W IT, so like blame riverdales continual jarchie baiting for this pls
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-20 03:36:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17014923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dancinghopper/pseuds/dancinghopper
Summary: Jughead thinks later that you might not call it intimate if you’d witnessed it. It probably didn’t look it, yelling and screaming over one another, but the way the barbs hit — right where they’re intended to go, picking at old wounds and old hurts so well hidden others wouldn’t even know to look — well, there’s something intimate about that.or;fivesix moments of intimacy





	i know you'd fool me again

**Author's Note:**

> TW/CW: this fic details a panic attack as viewed from the outside (it is in the first segment). jug uses touch to help archie through it which obviously will not work for everybody and as a rule of thumb i would advise not touching anyone during a panic attack unless they give u the go ahead. i’ve tried to write this to give the sense that these circumstances have happened before between archie and jug and they’ve already worked out boundaries/plans of attack/etc. jug also describes the panic attack as bad BUT i would probably call it mild. but on an archie scale it’s bad if that makes sense. idk i just wanted to be really clear about this because i don’t wanna upset anyone!!
> 
> oh also i’m so fucking weak for pet names as u might see so if any of u know some fics centring on that hmu pls

**i.**

 

It’s lunch and Archie is drumming his fingers incessantly against Jughead’s knee, has been for the last five minutes, the movements shaky and erratic against the denim. Jughead fights the urge to cover them with his own — he knows it won’t help, knows it’ll just trap Archie’s energy inside him until it bursts out in one big light show, but part of him wants to do it all the same.

It’s easy enough to guess what the issue is. Veronica is sitting across from them, chewing on a stick of celery, and she wants to talk about the Black Hood, how unsafe she feels in this town, how she doesn’t like that her girlfriend keeps sneaking out to see her.

“Relax, V,” says Betty, and touches Veronica’s arm softly. “Nothing’s going to happen to me.”

The drumming loses its (already slight) semblance of rhythm, turning instead into a mess of _tap, tap, tap_. Jughead’s been looking for an out for the last two minutes but does so with renewed vigour, something as simple as a break in conversation where he can slip in that they have to go, just subtle enough to not draw attention to the rigidness of Archie’s spine.

“But after what happened to Fred —“

Jughead winces, a second in advance before Archie jolts, practically propelling himself from the table.

“I have to —“

Betty and Veronica stare after him as he pushes his way outside, disappearing into a sea of kids still filling up their lunch trays, and Jughead gives him a second before standing to follow.

“Forget it,” he murmurs at Veronica’s apologetic expression, and goes off to find his boyfriend. He doesn’t tell her it’s okay, because it’s not, but it also isn't entirely her fault, so he tries to absolve her of the guilt best he can.

Archie’s slumped against the lockers just outside the cafeteria, hands drawn up to his face and the heels of his palms pressed to his eyes. Jughead swallows down the quick dart of panic that shoots through him at the sight. It's not the first panic attack he'll have coached Archie through, probably won't be the last, but it's not often that Archie won't try and get to a bathroom, somewhere away from wandering students and prying eyes. This has to be a bad one.

“Arch?”

He touches Archie’s elbow gently, warily, but the arm falls away from Archie’s face without much encouragement. Jughead nods to himself, and keeps his hand on Archie’s elbow. They’ve worked out that this is the way to help Archie when he’s like this, the way to help bring him back down to earth. It’s not Jug’s cup of tea, necessarily — when the situations are reversed, he’d rather be left to sort it out himself — but he’ll do it ( _always_ , always do it) to help Archie.

The other boy is muttering under his breath, eyes shut, counting from twenty backwards and then starting all over again in a rush, even though Jughead’s pretty sure the idea is to count with his breaths.

“Hey, Arch,” he says, and glances behind him. The hall is still empty. He clears his throat. “Archie, look at me.”

Archie doesn’t, which, alright, isn’t a great sign. Jughead runs his hand from Archie’s elbow to his shoulder, let’s it loop around Archie’s neck.

“Baby,” _(god, if Veronica ever fucking heard him)_ , “Archie. Pal. It’s okay.”

‘Baby’ gets Archie’s eyes to slide open, like it always does, which is the only reason Jug kept using it after that one time he doesn’t talk about. (Archie had had a head wound and was falling all over him the second he opened the door, and Jughead hadn’t known then it was from football, and he‘d been scared absolutely shitless, and he honestly didn’t know it was coming out until it did and now it’s, well, _something_ , and again, _please_ don’t tell Veronica.) He curls his fingers in the hair at the nape of Archie’s neck, stroking his thumb lightly across the skin. Tactility, Archie’s therapist had said, was very important in these instances.

“You’re okay,” says Jughead again, and brings his other hand up to the arm still raised to Archie’s face, repeating his earlier actions. “We’re at school, it’s fine.”

“Jug,” stutters Archie, and the other arm drops down to hang loose by his side. “Juggie. Hey. It's — it's okay, I’m fine.”

Jughead swallows. “Yeah,” he says, “Yeah, I know.”

He checks the hallway again out of the corner of his eye. “Come here,” he mumbles, and Archie tilts his head forward to rest his forehead against Jughead’s. They stand like that for a minute, as Archie’s breathing starts to return to regularity, Jughead’s hands still looped around his neck. He waits until Archie pulls back, until he shakes his shoulders in the way that always means he’s done dealing with something, and then Jughead says:

“Let’s skiv off english to go get some food. Not Pops, I want a pretzel. Like a real, good old fashioned pretzel. Made of dough. None of those shitty excuses for pretzels you have in your cupboard.”

“Jug,” starts Archie anxiously, “I can’t just keep —“

“Yes you can,” says Jughead, and links their hands together. “This isn’t about you, anyway, this is about my pretzel. You rate second to food, always.”

He gives him a little grin, and the tension in Archie’s shoulders relaxes.

“Yeah, alright,” he says. “S’long as you promise to help with whatever bullshit analysis he tasks us with.”

Normally Jughead might argue, but times like these remind him how utterly unfair it feels for the universe to be so decidedly set against someone as good as Archie Andrews, so he just agrees and holds Archie’s hand all the way to the school car park, and even though some random girl a grade below them stares, Jughead doesn’t really find it in himself to care.

 

**ii.**

 

“You’re such a dickhead, Jug!”

Archie yells this as Jughead races away from him with the supermarket trolley, gliding past packets of cereal as if he hasn’t got a care in the world. He ups his pace to a jog to keep up, while Jughead sends him the bird over his shoulder.

“Yeah, you know where you can stick that,” he grumbles, a little louder than he intended, and right as he passes some vaguely familiar middle-aged woman. She glares at him and Jughead laughs and laughs, propelling himself further down the aisle with the trolley.

“Sorry ma’am,” says Archie, red-faced,and hurries to catch up with Jughead. He shoves him and the trolley nearly careens into a pyramid of instant coffee, only just missing it, but Jughead’s still laughing wildly under the fluorescent lights, and Archie privately decides that his embarrassment is worth it ten times over.

 

**iii.**

 

‘Codependent’ haunts Jughead’s mood, itching itself up his throat and under his nails, a clammy feeling that settles restlessly between his shoulder blades. He’s not stupid, he _knows_ he and Archie are a little codependent. He _knows_ it probably not very healthy. But it’s not like either of them have got anyone else.

Still, Jughead is stubborn, and maybe that’s why, when he gets jumped for doing nothing other than wear a jacket, he decides to go to Betty’s instead of Archie’s.

He shoots her a text rather than ringing the doorbell because he thinks if Alice opened it he might lead her to an early death, and it’d probably be only about twenty percent because of the blood, and mostly because his shiner makes him look like his dad circa 1986.

Betty takes one look at him, however, and marches him over to the Andrews’, so maybe he’s not as stubborn as he thinks.

Archie opens the door, and he takes one look at Betty’s hand on the scruff of Jughead's neck, the bruise on his face and the leather still on his shoulders, and says: “What the fu— Jug, why didn’t you call me?”

Jughead shrugs. Mumbles something incoherent about codependency and taking care of himself. Archie tugs him inside wearing his Fred-Andrews-cross face, plonks him on one of the counter stools and pulls the first aid kit from the shelf.

Betty perches next to him, hand under her chin and asking when it got this bad. Asking if his foster family know, if they’re helping him, checking in to see if he’s getting roped into gang related activity.

 _Screw both of you_ , thinks Jughead, scowling, as Archie tilts his face up and dabs antiseptic on his cut. _You’re both too goddamn caring._

Archie’s hand lingers on his face, but he pulls it away after a glance at Betty, which just makes Jughead feel even worse. Literally all he wants to do is crawl into bed, preferably with Archie, and sleep for a couple of hours. Maybe he’ll have to resolve himself to independency tomorrow.

Betty lets herself out after a couple of pointed hints, sympathy ripe in her eyes. Jug manages to pull Archie into a hug before he can snap at him, and for a second he closes his eyes and pretends it’s all a-ok.

“I’m still pissed,” mumbles Archie, lips moving against the apex of his neck and shoulder. “But it’s mostly jus’ ‘cause you got hurt.”

He nods, and holds Archie a little tighter.

 

**iv.**

 

Jughead thinks later that you might not call it intimate if you’d witnessed it. It probably didn’t look it, yelling and screaming over one another, but the way the barbs hit — right where they’re intended to go, picking at old wounds and old hurts so well hidden others wouldn’t even know to look — well, there’s something intimate about that.

Archie yells about his new spot on the Southside, about the snake on his back and the fact that he’s hanging out with his dad when he was _never good enough for you, Jughead, and you know it but you just won’t believe it!_

Jughead snaps back about how Archie’s being just like everybody else on this godforsaken side of town, about his pig-headedness and his refusal to listen to what Jughead is _saying_ , like he’s being stupid on purpose.

And Archie gets madder, like Jug knew the jibe would make him, and tells him to _fuck off_ , real menace to his tone.

“Fine,” snaps Jughead, and storms out of the room, slamming Archie’s bedroom door behind him. He gets all the way to the bottom of the stairs before realising the only other place to go is his dad’s trailer, and that he’d rather turn around and march right back up to Archie than go there, fight be damned.

Jughead groans, loudly and uncaring, and kicks at the hallway rug (he’d kick the stairs, but he doesn’t want to add broken toe to his list of woes). He tugs on his shoes, readjusts his hat, and shuts the front door quietly just to piss Archie off and make him feel bad once he realises Jughead’s gone out. He goes to Pops because it’s the only thing open this late at night, even though it’ll be the first place Archie looks for him.

 _Maybe_ , thinks Jughead, ever realistic about his own personality, _that’s why I went_. Maybe he _wants_ Archie to come find him, _wants_ to fix this before morning, because there’s too much else that’s shitty in his life to add problems with Archie on top of it.

Jughead pulls the top off of his burger, puts it neatly on the side of his plate. He places a line of fries inside, then restores the bun to its rightful place. An Archie Special. He really is too sentimental.

Jughead groans again in frustration, pushes his plate away and lets his head drop to the table. Sentiment is what got him into this goddamn mess in the first place — his sudden reconnection to the Southside, to somewhere he _belongs_ , and if Archie could just _see_ that, realise that it’s not about Jughead choosing one or the other —

He sits like that for a while, thinking, long enough that his burger goes cold. When the bell finally chimes, he’s still mad, but he thinks he’s reached a point where he could reasonably try this conversation again.

“Hey, Juggie,” says Archie, voice soft and guilty, and Jughead is glad that his face is still pressed to the table. “You gonna, uh. You gonna eat that?”

He shakes his head, but doesn’t hear Archie live up to his question.

“I’m sorry, Jug,” says Archie instead, and Jughead pulls himself upright. Archie’s eyes are red rimmed. “I talked — I talked to Dad and he said some stuff that I — you know, about the Southside, and I want you know that it’s not that I think you’re, uh. It’s not — Fuck. I’m just.”

Archie takes a deep breath, and stares at a grease stain on the table. “Dad says that he thinks I’m probably so on edge about this because I’m — scared — and he’s — he’s right, Juggie. I don’t like not being able to — to protect you. You’re a kid and you’re — in a gang.”

Jughead scoffs, unable to help himself, and Archie flushes a bright red. It’s not that he thinks Archie is being stupid. It’s just that Jughead has spent a lot longer being acquainted with the grittiness of the real world, and that if either of them need protecting, it’s probably Archie. Yeah, he might be bigger, better at fighting back, but’s it’s not going to take much to break his heart, and Jughead’ll be damned if he lets that happen.

 _Or both of you need protecting,_ says a voice in his head that does, suspiciously, sound a bit like Fred Andrews, but Jughead squashes that thought right back down.

“Do I have to remind you,” he says, “that you _made_ a gang a couple of weeks ago? _That_ was stupid.”

“Yes,” says Archie, and looks him dead in the eyes, meaning clear. “It was.”

“Let’s talk about this tomorrow,” he adds after a moment. “If that’s — if that’s okay.”

Then, again, because Archie’s least favourite thing has always been the silent treatment: “I don’t wanna fight with you, Jug.”

Jughead huffs. Fiddles with the sleeve of his jacket. “Yeah,” he says. “Okay.”

They go home.

 

**v.**

 

“This is stupid,” says Jughead, with one hand on the wheel and another on the gear stick, engine rumbling beneath him and looking like he’d rather be anywhere but. “We don’t need to do this.”

Archie grins at him, a little delighted, “No, come on. It’ll be fun.”

“We’re gonna die,” says Jughead.

“Nobody’s _around_.” Archie glances in the mirrors to check, but in true Sunday fashion the area is still deserted. “We’ll just go up and down the street.”

“You should be able to drive, Juggie,” he adds, and Jughead scowls.

“I have a bike.”

“Impractical,” says Archie promptly. “Give it a go, come on. For me.”

He bats his eyelashes, half-joking, but he catches the way Jug’s frown deepens and knows he’s considering. He reaches across and grabs Jug’s shoulder reassuringly, digs his thumb slightly into the muscle. Jughead lets out a huff of defiance, and moves the gear shift.

“If we die it’s on you, Andrews.”

“I can live with that.”

 

**vi.**

 

Archie glances down at Jug, who’s slumped against his shoulder on the couch, face hot and sweaty where it’s pressed to his neck. _Firefly_ is playing on the TV, the sound turned down and the episode at a bit of a lull. Archie takes the opportunity to poke Jughead with the hand draped over his shoulders.

“Jug,” he mumbles, affectionate. “You gotta let me take your hat off, bud, you’re cooking.”

Jughead lets out an unintelligible groan and Archie stifles a grin because really, he _isn’t_ laughing, he _swears._

“You’ve got a fever.”

“No I don’t,” says Jughead, on cue, as if the drained nature of his voice and stuffy nose don’t give it away immediately. Archie jostles him a bit.

“It’s admit to the fever or lose the hat, Jug. ‘M not afraid to use force.”

Jughead nestles deeper into his neck, still mumbling. There’s a few moments of quiet, and then: “I don’t have a fever.”

Archie chuckles, and brings his free arm up to tug the hat from Jug’s head. His boyfriend lets out a suspiciously relieved sounding hum.

“There you go,” says Archie, and chucks the hat onto the coffee table. “Feel better?”

“Hmph,” mutters Jughead.

Archie grins again, and shifts into a more comfortable position, thinking he's probably going to be here for  _at least_ another episode, if not two. He kisses Jughead's forehead.

"Sap," grumbles Jughead against his skin, in a way that suggests Archie has done him a great wrong.

"Whatever," says Archie, unfazed. "You love me."

Jughead makes a non-committal noise, and shuffles closer.

"You're alright," he says, and Archie hears it for what it is.

**Author's Note:**

> in case anyone is curious, these are the prompts i used:  
> \- calming each other down  
> \- teasing/innuendo  
> \- hurt/comfort  
> \- fighting  
> \- facing fears  
> \- sickness/saying the words
> 
> i picked firefly for the two to watch because i am on a bit of a roll w it and i think jug would totally liken archie to malcom reynolds and also idk it’s just like a blend of their two personalities??? enough action for archie but enough nuance and subtext for jug. but maybe i just wanna convert ppl to it who knows???


End file.
